If you have a Bible today, I'd like to ask you to turn to the book of 1 Timothy chapter one. And it's gonna be a little different this morning. I'm gonna just skip around to three places to read today to start. One verse at a time. And I ask you to bear with me for just a moment as I want to express what the Lord has placed on my heart today. First Timothy chapter one, and I'd like to read verse 11 and verse 18 from that chapter, and then we'll go to the end of the book and read one out of chapter six. First Timothy chapter one, looking at verse 11. It says this, according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust, Verse 18, this charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare. If you'll look to the very last chapter, the 18th verse of that chapter, I believe. Excuse me, the 20th verse of that chapter. It says this, O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings and oppositions of science falsely so called. And that'll conclude our reading this morning. Generally I give a title in order to kind of, well David puts these online, so that's one reason, but also kind of keeps me centered. I have a dear brother that I love who's preached here before, filled in for me. I think preached revivals before, and he comes up with very creative titles, so I'm gonna take a place from his creativity. Thought of that this morning. Baptocostalism. Spiritual leadership or spiritual stewardship. Now, I think you all know what I'm referring to in Bapticostalism. There are obviously various denominations within Christendom at large, and we call ourselves Baptist. Reasons for that, there's another denomination called Pentecostals. And the stereotype is that they tend to be of the more emotional sort. So if we merge these two words together, we're talking about emotional Baptist, I guess, right? And this morning, I wanna talk about the idea of spiritual leadership along with spiritual stewardship. Temporarily, I'm going to step away from our text, but I'm gonna come back to it here in just a few moments because it's gonna inform a lot of what we talk about this morning. Before we look at our text, I wanna make some, I wanna establish some pillars, place some things that I consider unwaverable, unmoving, that are both tenets of our faith and distinctives of our faith, contrasting that to other Christian denominations. One such prominent one is the belief that we have that the people of God can be led of the Lord. The book of Romans chapter 8 verse 14 tells us that they that are led of the Spirit are the children or the sons of God. And so an identifying factor for knowing that someone is truly born again is a mark is that they follow and are led of the Holy Spirit. In the book of Acts, we see this many times. I'm only going to point out a few of those, and if you want to have your Bible and look with me, I'm just going to highlight a couple examples here. In the book of Acts chapter 8, we find an occasion where there's a great revival going on in the province of Samaria. Philip has gone there and has shared the gospel with a bunch of Samaritans, which was a profound incident in the history of the Lord's church. And after he goes there, a strange thing occurs. He is led to leave a revival that is seeing great spiritual prosperity to go out to the desert. Now that's a strange, that's unusual behavior. Generally speaking when we see God's Spirit working in a place and the gospel prevailing over the hearts of people it would make the most sense for us to stay and to continue to minister and the pattern of acts is that when that occurs if Paul was not persecuted and driven out of the city most often he stayed in those places and Continued to disciple those people because that's the pattern of the New Testament that Jesus left for us us. But Philip breaks this pattern. He doesn't stay in this place and continue to disciple And so what justifies or what is the catalyst to Philip's leaving Samaria? And in verse 29 it tells us, very succinctly it says, then the Spirit said unto Philip, go near and join thyself to this chariot. So we find earlier that the Lord led him out of Samaria, and here we find a time and a place where the Holy Spirit communicated to the heart of Philip that he needed to go and join himself to this chariot of a stranger and begin to minister the gospel to him. Now, I hope that you have had, if you've been saved for any period of time, that you have had an experience like what Philip has. Those that are the children of God are led by the Holy Spirit at times to do things and to behave in ways that only the Holy Spirit knows the mind of God and that His will will be accomplished in this act and that we as human beings are just walking by faith and we step out in faith and do something perhaps even uncharacteristic to our natural temperament or our natural spiritual exercises that we're prone to doing because God has impressed us and spoken to us to act in that way. I wanna say this morning, if you have children who are lost, I hope that you are open to the leadership of the Spirit to minister to them in your home. I'm not saying, and we'll get to this in a moment, that you're sitting around twiddling your thumbs always waiting. But I am saying that you believe and have surrendered your heart to the place, to God, that Lord, I want to follow you, and if there is a spontaneous action that you want me to take, that when I woke up this morning I never planned to do, here I am, send me. In the book of Acts, chapter 10, we find another occasion in the household of Cornelius. Acts chapter 10 verses 19 and 20 says this. Another occasion where What he's being led to do, and I don't have time to get into it, is very strange and is not according to traditional religious custom for the time. Jews cannot intermingle with Gentiles. But the Holy Spirit spoke to his heart and said, there are men here, don't ask questions, go. There's an example of this occurring. Both of these are in the positive. Let's consider one in the negative. Acts chapter 16, verse six and seven. Paul on his second missionary journey. Now when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, listen to this, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia. After they were come to Mycenae, they assayed to go into Bithynia, but the spirit suffered them not. So here we have two occasions. The two provinces next to Galatia are the two that Paul, his traveling companions of Timothy and Silas, they're determined to go there to preach the gospel. They've seen great success in Galatia, and so as they're attempting to carry out the ministry God has for them, they say, hey, we see these neighboring provinces, there are cities there that are in darkness, let us go and preach to them. And so they had determined to go, but in the midst of their determination, the Holy Spirit says, do not go there, stop. And so we can find in the scriptures, in the book of Acts in particular, in particular in the New Testament, many times, three examples here, where the Holy Spirit leads the people of God into what they're supposed to do. I believe we find a type of this in the Old Testament in the wilderness time with the children of Israel, right? They're delivered, they're emancipated from Egyptian bondage. They cross the Red Sea. All they had known is slavery to the Egyptians. Now they're free. But they don't know how to be free. That's a really important point. The people of God did not know what to do with their freedom. And when they trusted in their own perspective entirely, they were led astray by the corruption of their own flesh. And so it was necessary for God, and in his infinite grace, he provided them a cloud by day that would guide them where they needed to go. And even after they had sinned against God, even after they had rebelled and were sentenced in one sense to wandering in the wilderness, at no point did God remove the cloud from leading the children of God in their 40 years of wandering. And that's a clear picture of the Holy Spirit which has been entrusted and given to all of us. the indwelling of the Spirit, and we are to follow at His beckoning command where we're to go and what we are to do, and praise God as we wander throughout this wilderness, we have a guide. The Holy Spirit is our guide until we get to the promised land. But what about when the spirit doesn't lead? Or how detailed is that leadership? So, I was in a series of services before, and I humorously say that there was a Baptocostal there, right? A guy very sensitive to his emotions. He got up and he was real fired up, He told us that morning that he began to pray and God told him what cereal to eat. That's a new one. Different. Is it possible? Sure. Is it probable that of all the things the Holy Spirit leads the Christian to do, that deciding to eat Cheerios instead of Frosted Flakes was the top of his order that morning for the life of that brother, I'll let you be the judge of that. I think that his mindset was a derivative of a misunderstanding about the leadership of the Holy Spirit. Because we're not talking about what the Spirit is capable of doing. We all know that the Holy Spirit can lead us to do things that on the norm, he does not do. And we need to be as familiar with the voice of the Lord as we can be through prayer and the study of his word and yield, even when we don't understand why he's leading us to do something. But there has to be a balance. There has to be a balance of understanding of the heart, not into how much we do or do not trust our emotions, but as to the way that God works. Because the only thing, the only way that God works is not in accordance with just spiritual leadership, but what this book of 1 Timothy reveals to us is that God also works through spiritual stewardship. And this book, I believe, if there was a major theme that jumps out to me in this book of 1 Timothy, in 2 Timothy and in Titus, what are often called the pastoral epistles, I think what we're gonna find is that the theme of these things is the idea of being a steward of what God has given. If we look at the verses that we read to you, In the King James in verse 11 and verse 18, it uses the word it's been committed to your trust. Let me read them in a different version just to see if this makes more sense to some of you. According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted. So we think of a steward and we think of someone who has been entrusted with something that is not their own. Verse 18. Paul writing to Timothy, so in verse 11, he's talking about this. The Lord has entrusted Paul with the glorious gospel. That goes right into the next few verses where he says this, God counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry. So you'll notice here, the idea of faithfulness is directly connected to the idea of being entrusted with something. Paul had been entrusted with the gospel, and the reason, he says, was that God saw him as one who was faithful to carry out the ministry of the gospel. And Paul, concluding his own responsibility to God, then directs his attention to this young disciple, Timothy, and he says this in verse 18. This command, I entrust to you, Timothy, my son. So what we see here is that Paul recognizes he has been entrusted as a steward of the gospel. Now he is responsible for training this young man, and now he is saying to this young man who has progressively taken on more responsibility over the churches of the living God that Paul had been helped by God to establish, and he's saying this, now Timothy, I am entrusting you with this command. And the rest of the book, Paul is instructing him that to be a good steward of what I have entrusted you with, here are the things you need to do and how you need to instruct God's people. Now I come to the very end, look at chapter six in verse 20 that I read to you. He says the same type of language. So he starts his letter off saying, I've been entrusted. He continues at the beginning saying, now I'm entrusting you. He gives him all the responsibilities that Paul, excuse me, that Timothy has, all the ways that he wants to steward his responsibility. And he comes to the end and he says this, oh Timothy, protect what has been entrusted to you. So we can see here that Paul recognizes that there is an element to which, now, throughout this book, stewardship language is used all throughout the book. Talks about being faithful. Paul talks about being appointed. In the Greek, oftentimes, I think, I can't remember, in the King James, I think it says the bishop, Right, a pastor, one that aspires to be a bishop. In the original Greek, it's the overseer. A word directly tied to stewardship. Within that, it says a man who is qualified to be an overseer must be a good manager of his home. Over and over he says this, this is trustworthy. Or in order to, if you carry this out, you are found trustworthy. And so what we find about the Apostle Paul's understanding as he's committing the trust to this young preacher is that there is certainly, and Timothy himself had witnessed in the life of Paul through his missionary journeys, the Holy Spirit leading Paul to do things from the Lord. We see that and Timothy saw that and he saw the example that Paul was. But also he recognized this, the Lord not only leads us, but he entrusts us. He entrusts you and he entrusts I foremost with the gospel. The church of the living God, we find here in the book of First Timothy in chapter three that he tells us, and I wanna find this verse really quickly because it's an important one. He says this. In chapter three, verse 14 and 15, it says, these things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly. But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. So here's what Paul says, it's gonna be a while before I can get there. I'm writing this letter because I want you to know how you're supposed to behave in the house of God. Because the house of God is the strength of the truth. It's the pillar, it's the ground of the truth. And so, you and I, as the church of the living God, have been entrusted by God with the glorious saving message of the Gospel. All of it. And it is a heavy burden. It's a joyous one, but it's a heavy one to make sure that as a church, we are not becoming lopsided towards one side of the gospel and not the other side of the gospel that as much as was within us, We are applying ourselves, as Paul tells Timothy to do, to the study of the scriptures that both in our homes and in our corporate worship, we can present the whole counsel of God to the people of God. My wife, I don't know if it would be entrusted with or burdened with, feeding our home. She makes those decisions. Occasionally, she asks for an opinion. That's hers, from the groceries, to how the recipe's put together, to the nutrients that the family is getting. All of those things are in her hands. And as such, she is particular and mindful, not driven just by flavor, not driven just by what the occupants of the home want. All of those things come into play. But there is necessarily a diversity because what our bodies needs have a diversity of needs. And so from one day to the next, from one meal to the next, from one week to the next, there is certainly variation. because there are core things, however, that drive what is put on the table. And this morning as a church, we have been entrusted with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And it is necessary if we're going to faithfully steward the gospel that we do so, obviously surrender to the will of the Holy Spirit, but also acutely aware of the needs of the congregation among us. As fathers, you have been entrusted as the priest of your home to serve your home on behalf of God. to serve them with what? With the word. To see from season to season what the need of the home is as it relates to the gospel of Christ, and to make sure that you are striving to provide, even if you yourself feel that you're at a deficit in accordance with the word, that you would seek it out, that you might provide it according to the needs of the home. So, what happens, I think, common, very common thing that I've seen is when the leadership of the Holy Spirit is overemphasized and the Holy Spirit does not lead in every jot and tittle as to what you're supposed to do, then there's some side effects that begin to cause people to get very fearful. In other words, if you're experiencing this, I want you to think about this. Let's say you say, Lord, I wanna read my Bible. Come up with a very simple example. I don't know where to start. So you get down and pray and you say, Lord, where should I start? And nothing happens. So that day you don't read your Bible. And the next day, you pray and you say, Lord, where do I start? I'm really eager, I'm real excited to start. And nothing happens. And day after day after day, nothing happens. Let me ask you a very common sense question. What should you do? You should realize you've been made a steward. And with that stewardship, if you feel a sense of incompetence, go to those with whom you perceive have been good stewards of studying the word and seek their counsel. Because God has revealed to them, and they have in some ways become a good steward in his word. and the qualities that made them good stewards may lend themselves very well to you. So what about testifying in the house of God? Now, I wanna say this, because I think it's important. I don't want Satan to distort what I'm trying to say. We're all different. We're all very different. One size doesn't always fit all. I recognize that. Praise God that he puts us together as a church, Some are going to be more vocal. Some are gonna be less vocal. Some are gonna be more studious. Some are gonna be less studious. So take that as a backdrop to what I'm saying this morning. I'm not trying to coerce everyone to be the same, but let me ask this question. Brother Elias didn't testify this morning about being grateful to go to Do Re Mi, so we have some young kids here who have been given a voice and a desire to sing, right? They've been given a gifted voice, Why does the gifting matter? Because sometimes that can encourage and edify your brothers and sisters who need some encouragement and edification. And so as you look around the congregation this morning, singing special songs or singing songs at all are not designed for entertainment purposes. They're not only designed to worship God. They can also be designed to be an edifying action or an encouraging action towards the hearts of your brothers and sisters. And so young people this morning who have just come back from Do-Re-Mi, if you know the Lord, you have been entrusted with an ability and with a desire to sing. And I wanna encourage you this morning that as you feel the prompting of the Holy Spirit to do so, follow his leadership. But I wanna take it a step further. as you perceive it would be a good steward to honor the Lord in our collective gathering, be a good steward. In other words, don't sit and wait for the feeling all the time. Sometimes God has given us a spirit of discernment that we can discern that there is a palpable need in our congregation that there is sorrow that is going throughout our congregation over the loss of a loved one, and that for whatever reason throughout this week, God had led your thoughts and you're humming all week long this specific song that is directed largely towards the grieving heart. It's one of encouragement and edification. Am I wrong in suggesting that maybe you ought to be very thoughtful? at loving your brother and sister and encouraging them in that way. I don't think it's a step too far at all. I think it's exactly the spirit of what Paul is teaching Timothy. He begins to say, teach your young men this. Teach your young women this. Look for men who are qualified as overseers in this fashion. When you get together in the house of God, you all ought to give yourselves to public reading, to exhortation, to prayer. He begins to tell, now he's not micromanaging them. He's entrusting Timothy with that responsibility. Let me ask you as a parent a question. If you go, we have a playroom upstairs at our house, and it is a filthy mess all the time. Once a month, Kathleen tells the boys, go clean the playroom. And you'd have thought Armageddon hit when she says that to them, right? They hate that job more than anything else. So initially, when we would tell them to do that, and they were a bit younger, we'd go up there after 45 minutes of work, and it looked like nothing had happened. Apple cores still lying around everywhere, half-rotten, and all the things that you can imagine that would be up in an all-boys playroom. So what we would have to do at a certain point is we'd have to go up there and say, okay, now Danny, you pick this up, and you pick that up, and you pick that up, It was tedious, it was laborious, it was disappointing, it was frustrating. But I had to recognize it was largely because they were not yet mature enough to faithfully execute what they had been entrusted with. Now there's a different story. Now we have boys who are older. Their definition of clean, not yet to the degree to mom's standpoint of clean is, it's closer, it's more aligned. And so when they go up to the playroom and they begin to pick things up, when we go up there, 90 to 95% of the job is done well. As a dad, as a mother, which of the two situations do you think is more pleasing to us? the one that required micromanaging, or the one whereby I could give an entrusting of stewardship, they would complete the most of the job, and whatever they were unable to complete because of their lack of ability, I helped them. In the house of the Lord, this is not rebuking, this is instructional, so take it that way. Some of you do not give God praise in the house of the Lord publicly. I'm not rebuking you for that. What I'm wanting to awaken in your heart and your mind is the possibility that maybe you're waiting for something that God never designed to come. What if your mindset is, Lord, I'm just waiting for you to tell me to praise you? I mean, think about that. You ever, If you're a man here today, today's your day, so I'm not gonna lean on you too hard. My wife takes care of all the, I'm sounding like a lazy guy this morning, aren't I? My wife takes care of all the present giving. So if you get a present from me, it has my name signed on it, I don't even know what we got you, okay? My wife takes care of all that. There's two days a year, really three days a year, I gotta be on it, and sometimes I'll jokingly tell Kathleen on her birthday, well, get yourself something you like, right? It almost comes to the place where I'm so dependent on her that she has to tell me to do things for her that need to be done. Now, obviously, that's a humorous example, but it's meant to illustrate an important point. Has God entrusted us with a stewardship, and we're waiting on his leadership? I want to talk for just a moment about the dangers of simply waiting on his leadership instead of being a faithful steward of what he's given us. Something that has been over the last two years more and more upon my mind is when we're in the house of the Lord, Our base thought, now there's seasons in a church, right? Our minds are taken to different places and that's okay. Our base, when we gather for worship, is that from the time we come in until the time we leave, our thoughts should be on Christ. I mean, can we all agree with that? That when we come here, we come here to worship Jesus Christ. when a culture of a church becomes predominantly oriented towards poking and prodding people to follow the Lord. Now, I want you to follow the Lord. I'm not saying it's either or. Don't misunderstand me. But when that is the entire emphasis of the gathering, here's the result. People sit in the house of God thinking about their feelings and not thinking about Christ. Have you ever been there? Where there's a service going on and there are people who God has clearly led and moved and praise God when he does that. I can rejoice in your testimony when I can discern in my spirit that God has prompted you and that there is something that he has weighed heavy upon your heart and it has led to the edification and the encouragement of God's people. It's a wonderful thing when that occurs. but very often how I had been instructed is then I need to sit around and think about how I feel and try to discern whether I feel the way you felt. I've spent years of services getting into a point where God was moving and all I was thinking about is me. You know what I think God's powerful enough to do? that if our focus is Christ, and our collective desire is to worship and uplift his name, and we have expressed a permanent willingness to him in our prayers, Lord, make me willing that if your spirit leads me, I am willing to do and to say and to go however you say. but my mind and heart is going to be constantly captivated by the worship and adoration of your son, Jesus. You know how this is just, I'm inferring this, so take it as such. In the book of Acts, I can, I infer from the book of Acts that the Apostles were centered exclusively on the marvel of what Jesus Christ did and who He was. Because every time they're preaching, every time they're testifying, be it an extemporaneous account that was unexpected, like Paul up on Mars Hill in Athens, or be it one where he's going in Thessalonica each Sabbath day for three weeks, what did he open and allege from the Scriptures? That Jesus was the Christ. Their hearts and minds were centered on the person of Christ always. And when Paul is sitting there watching Athens and seeing all the idolatry, the Bible says that his heart was stirred within him. It doesn't say the Spirit moved him, it says that other place is an ax. It says his heart was stirred. And I think what that meant is this, he was focused and centered on Jesus Christ, and he saw a whole culture given to paganism, and it tore him up inside. And he didn't need leadership from the Lord, he needed to be a steward of what God had revealed to him, this glorious gospel, and to reveal to those people what they needed to hear about Jesus. This morning I'm not supposing that it is one or the other, it is both. It's both. We need the leadership of the Lord like Philip and we need the stewardship that God gives to Timothy. A problem with always waiting for the feeling is we become feeling-centered and me-centered. We don't wanna be that way. We want a church that's Christ-centered. Here's how you can discern that that's often happened. When the songs that we sing become more emotion-laden than Christ-centered. I think Ashley does a good job, I'm not accusing her of that. What I'm saying is I've been to places before where it became the clear intent to move the emotions of man and woman, not uplift Christ. I've sat in those services before wondering why I was there. Why am I here? I've seen preachers go way too far prodding a congregation. Do you feel anything you need to say? Do you feel anything you need to do? And they prod and they prod and they prod and that leads to a second danger. People who are more sensitive to emotions begin to confuse the movement of the Holy Spirit from their emotions. And the book of Corinthians tells us that the spirit of the prophets is made subject to the prophets. And if you look at what that means in the book of Corinthians, they were getting outlandish in their emotional displays, speaking in tongues, and preaching, and interpreting, and in doing all these things, they were going way overboard. And Paul says, hold on a second. You have control over your own emotions and actions. Your spirit can control it. Don't pretend like you're carried away and there's nothing you can do about it. The spirit of the prophets is made subject to the prophet. So then we have this tilting. This isn't always the case. I'm not saying this is universal, but I've seen it very often where Immature, emotion-heavy people who are stunted in their spiritual growth begin to lead the church in corporate worship perpetually under the guise of always being led of the Lord. It's always been confusing. Now listen, I don't sit, when I'm in a service, I don't ever sit and say, huh, I wonder if that was of the Lord or that wasn't. I don't do that. Here's what I do, I look for a trend line. Look for a trend line. Here's what I mean. If there becomes a habit that's something that's normative, I'll give you a perfect example of this. Kids participating in worship. I think they should do it, don't you? But I don't think they should lead us in worship all the time. In other words, this, I think kids should, as they feel inclined, sing, please. As a kid feels inclined to testify, I want you to follow the Lord, do it, please. And I would say, we could probably use some looseness in that area, don't you think? Some of you kids, if you feel inclined to edify your brother or encourage, feel free to do that. But what if the normative of church becomes this? The men sit and never say anything. The spiritually mature women never testify, never exhort, never instruct, never encourage, but the kids have come to learn that whatever feeling I have is indicative of the movement of the Holy Spirit, so I need to do it. Again, I don't sit and say, well, that obviously wasn't on the Lord that was, but here's what I do look for. If that's the normative practice of a church, that's not in accordance with what we've been entrusted to be good stewards of. Men, you ought to be leaders in worship. I'm not mad, I'm not angry, I'm just making a biblical statement. Men ought to be leaders in worship. If you're the leader of your home, and they're following you, you being centered, on the worship of Christ will be a direct example in your home of how to worship Jesus Christ in corporate worship. This morning, I wanna encourage you. I wanna say another thing. Oftentimes, people have waited to do the right thing until they felt led, and it leads them to hopelessness and despair. So if you're always waiting, I call it the zap. You're always waiting for the emotional zap. You're waiting for it all the time. And God withholds it because he's expecting more maturity from you. He's not expecting to have to lead you to read your Bible and lead you in a conversation with friends to share the gospel when that comes up. You ever had that happen before? I remember being at a place before with a friend, an old high school friend of mine. We ended up working together some. the conversation started in politics and it moved to philosophy, and then it just kind of suddenly like became obvious that my philosophical base was religious, was biblical. And I remember there for a moment, like whispering a prayer as he was talking, like, Lord, am I supposed to talk here? Am I supposed to tell him about the biblical? And I felt like the Holy Spirit, he didn't say it like this, but duh, obviously, If I'm a good steward of this opportunity and this friendship, let me do that now. What am I talking about this morning? All of these things. Believe it or not, many of these things emanated in light of our revival coming up. We want the Lord to lead us in our revival, and I want us to pray to that end. That's not different than what you normally do, right? I wanna add something to your prayer. In our lead up to revival, and in the midst of our revival, if God said this, I am entrusting you with these services. I am entrusting you with the gospel that's going to be heard. I'm entrusting you with the lost souls of your children, of those that you love in the church. I'm entrusting you with that. Now be a good steward, I'll be back. Does that change your behavior? Maybe does that inform or enrich your behavior? I think it does. I think it humbles me. We find in the scriptures these parables that Jesus gave as stewardship, where he would say, you get one talent, you get, what is it, three talents and five talents, or whatever the number was, and I'm going away and I'll come back. Favorite thing that I've discovered about one of those parables when Jesus, you can't get this in any of the translations, but you get it in the Greek, because the Greek is a more vibrant language, where the man who has five talents, his language is of one who is excited to give an account for what he's done. You know, my kids get that way with the playroom. When they've done a really good job, when they actually, believe it or not, the vacuum got out, whole floor got vacuumed, every toy's put away, every tray's gone. You know what the two big boys do? They come downstairs excited to give an account for what they had been made responsible for. And in that parable, the man who had labored and stewarded what God had given him and had attempted with all of his strength to gain as much as what he could, when the master came back to say, give me an account, he was excited. I'm so glad you're here, master. Look at what all I've done. I've labored and I've worked. My heart has been set. And maybe I steward this in ways that if you had been standing here, you would have corrected, but I did what I could with what I had. You know, the one that was rebuked was the one who was fearful to steward what God had given him. And so he buried it. Have you been given a testimony of salvation this morning? How are you stewarding that? Have you been given an ability to sing from the heart? and to keep your eyes and heart focused upon Christ. Who cares about what you sound like? Have you given that ability? Have you been given that desire? Do you sing in the car on the way to work, glorifying God? Do you sing in the shower? Do you sing at home when nobody's around and your heart is full of praise? How are you stewarding that gift? Have you been given the ability to articulate yourself well? in a way that would be encouraging to your brothers and sisters? Have you been given some spiritual discernment to see in people, perhaps when they're in need of encouragement and help, how are you using that voice in private to love them, to care for them? God has made us stewards. one of the most formative, and I've told you this before, and I'm gonna try to close, one of the most formative people in my life, I can't nail down what their gift was. None of those things I just mentioned was their gift. They were probably tone deaf, because they couldn't sing very well, and they definitely couldn't in a public setting speak very well. But they were very formative. They very well informed what I wanted in a spouse. Older lady. And here's the only thing I can tell you about what was entrusted to her that she stewarded well, the desire to love other people. It was these intangible things, these silly things, these little things that were not an act based upon, it was an act based upon the desire to love. I want you to know you're loved. And so if that came in the encouragement of how wonderful I did at something. And I'm sitting there thinking, I know I didn't do that one. I remember when I was learning to play the piano, I'd go over to their house and they had a piano. And I was awful. I was playing hot cross buns. But that was the best hot cross buns she had ever heard in her life. And she edified and encouraged, keep going. Keep going. This morning, maybe you go down the list and you say, I can't sing, I can't do this, I can't do that. Let me tell you what you can do. You can be entrusted by God with loving the people around you. And that has as much or more power as displaying the gospel as speaking it. Because it is the gospel. This morning, in light of our revival. A few weeks away, I want to ask you to be prayerful. How can I be a good steward of what God has given us? It may take some coordination on our parts, right? Maybe those of you that sing say, you know what, I want to do it together. Let's do it together. Let's come together and sing. And the whole time you're doing it, let me just give you a little advice. Harmonize the best you can, great. But establish in your heart that the reason you're standing up is because you want your voice to exalt Jesus Christ. And the whole time you are singing, let that be your aim. This morning, I would not at all say that we should not be led of the Lord, we should. But a necessary companion to being led of the Lord is being a steward of what we've been entrusted with. To me, that's how a healthy church operates. An unhealthy church believes one too far, either way. You see it today sometimes where every part of the service is coordinated, and in their minds, they're being good stewards. Everybody who's gonna pray a prayer has already been chosen. Every song that's gonna be sung is chosen. Everything is done because it's stewardship focused. Others become baptocostal. I think the design of the Lord's Church was that we understand we're made stewards and at any moment God has the prerogative to lead us within that stewardship. This morning I I pray and I hope a spirit of judgment does not sound like it came out. That was not the intent whatsoever. It was meant to be a balancing of these two things and I hope the Lord would speak to you in that.